Bottas puts Mercedes on top on Day 2 of Bahrain F1 test

The afternoon got off to a slow start in Sakhir, with most teams initially opting for longer runs.

Alfa Romeo's Antonio Giovinazzi was the first driver to improve on his morning time, while Mick Schumacher, Lance Stroll, Lando Norris and Gasly made their first appearance of the day.

Just under an hour into the afternoon session, Bottas took over the Mercedes W12 from Lewis Hamilton after being limited to six laps on Friday due to a gearbox failure.

Halfway into the session, laptimes started taking a tumble. Giovinazzi marked his 100th lap of the day with a 1m31.533 on softs to take first place, immediately overhauled by McLaren's Norris' 1m31.239s on the same compound.

Giovinazzi then improved to 1m31.323s to slot in just 0.084s behind the young Briton.

AlphaTauri driver Gasly jumped to third with a 1m31.683s on softs right before the first red flag of the afternoon came out.

With 1h20m to go, Sergio Perez' engine cover came off his Red Bull as he ducked out of the slipstream of Williams' Nicholas Latifi on the main straight, the cover disintegrating.

After a brief clean-up a flurry of activity saw the lead change hands several times. Giovinazzi went top with a 1m30.881s on soft Pirelli tyres, but Gasly instantly replied by going quicker still with a 1m30.825s on the same tyre compound.

Norris then lowered the benchmark to 1m30.586s, only for Gasly to return to the top of the timetable with a 1m30.413 on Pirelli's softest C5 compound.

Meanwhile, Bottas had been making inroads with a 1m31.245s on unmarked medium tyres followed by a 1m31.172s on softs.

In the final 30 minutes, Bottas took on C5 tyres, which first netted him a 1m30.460s before grabbing the lead from Gasly with a 1m30.289s.

After a slow start on Friday, Mercedes got in a good number of laps on Day Two. Hamilton - who was 15th fastest overall - managed to complete 58 laps in the morning session despite losing time due to a spin, with Bottas bringing Mercedes' daily tally to 115 tours.

Stroll drove his Aston Martin, which had been parked in the garage for most of the morning with a gearbox issue, to third just 0.171 behind Bottas.

Norris' erstwhile leading time was good for fourth, while Giovinazzi secured fifth with a personal best of 1m30.760s on the softest compound.

With a new engine cover securely attached, Perez went back out and briefly demoted Charles Leclerc in the Ferrari, but a better lap time from Leclerc on C5 tyres moved the Monegasque driver up to sixth.

Perez also had to yield seventh place to soft-shod Latifi, who had a highly productive day in the Williams FW43B which also included an innocent spin under braking for Turn 1.

Daniel Ricciardo's leading morning session time was good for ninth on the day in the McLaren.

On his first appearance since fracturing his jaw in a cycling accident, Fernando Alonso completed a trouble-free 128 laps for Alpine to round out the top 10, setting his best time before lunch.

AlphaTauri's Yuki Tsunoda was 11th after his morning stint followed by Schumacher, who had taken over the Haas from Nikita Mazepin in the afternoon.

Morning runner Carlos Sainz was 13th for Ferrari with Mazepin, Hamilton and Vettel at the bottom of the timesheets. Vettel's gearbox issues limited the German to just 10 laps in the Aston Martin AMR21.

A late red flag for system checks brought the penultimate day of winter testing to a close, with two more four-hour sessions to follow on Sunday.

Cla	Driver	Chassis	Laps	Time	Gap
1	Valtteri Bottas	Mercedes	58	1'30.289
2	Pierre Gasly	AlphaTauri	87	1'30.413	0.124
3	Lance Stroll	Aston Martin	71	1'30.460	0.171
4	Lando Norris	McLaren	52	1'30.586	0.297
5	Antonio Giovinazzi	Alfa Romeo	125	1'30.760	0.471
6	Charles Leclerc	Ferrari	73	1'30.886	0.597
7	Nicholas Latifi	Williams	132	1'31.672	1.383
8	Sergio Perez	Red Bull	117	1'31.682	1.393
9	Daniel Ricciardo	McLaren	52	1'32.215	1.926
10	Fernando Alonso	Alpine	128	1'32.339	2.050
11	Yuki Tsunoda	AlphaTauri	57	1'32.684	2.395
12	Mick Schumacher	Haas	88	1'32.883	2.594
13	Carlos Sainz Jr.	Ferrari	56	1'33.072	2.783
14	Nikita Mazepin	Haas	76	1'33.101	2.812
15	Lewis Hamilton	Mercedes	58	1'33.399	3.110
16	Sebastian Vettel	Aston Martin	10	1'38.849	8.560
View full results